Rise of the Dragon Riders
by TheSilentChloey
Summary: An Alternate Universe to the How to Train Your Dragon films. The story follows Hiccup, as a young woman and the struggles she has with her dragon, a Night Fury called "Toothless" as she struggles with her gifts and being accepted by her father. This will be much darker than HTTYD, and will follow a slightly different path. Feel free to comment. Rated M for safety


Prologue: Dragons

On a rocky, cave filled island in the middle of the ocean there lived a young woman named Hiccup. She was an unsual woman as she  
had lost the lower part of her left leg in a battle against a massive dragon that was threating both humans and dragons a like. Now it was  
a metal peg that she wore partly as a reminder, but also partly because she matched her pet dragon, a Night Fury that she called  
"Toothless". She'd lived with the dragon for five years and learned more about the dragons in five years than the fifteen she lived in Berk.  
Hiccup put it down to the fact that she was vastly different back then, hating the dragons because she didn't understand them. It was  
only after she shot down Toothless five years ago that she began the path of finding who she was. At first she was afraid of the dark  
large dragon. Oh it started out shakily enough with Hiccup presenting the dragon with a fish. Toothless was so hungry he at the fish  
leaving a very nervous Hiccup backing up to a rock before offering her half of it by regurgitating it for her. She smiled as she  
remembered how silly she was then to be scared, but at the time it was the way she felt. Of course this was after she'd had a near miss  
with a Gronkle, so it was understandable, heck Gobber said that dragons always went for the kill. She then spent the next few afternoons  
with Toothless and a bond began to form in spite of the obvious fact that the pair were rather unusual.

Obviously Toothless knew that Hiccup wasn't able to hurt him, so he didn't really care too much for the girl's presence and he was rather  
absorbed with trying to get out of the clearing that he'd landed into. Hiccup wanted to learn more about the dragon, even going as far as  
to ask Gobber if there was anything more on Night Furies in the "Book of Dragons" as she read it one night when the class was over and  
she'd eaten what she could. There were so many dragons and she'd wished she could learn as much as she could about them. Gobber  
had snapped at the teen irritably about focusing on the lesson, but she had so many questions. It didn't help then that Astrid had landed  
on her and the axe was stuck in Hiccup's shield. Of course Hiccup was trying to pry the axe loose as well as Astrid and it wasn't until  
Hiccup's arm was near crushed by the other girl's strength and her shield was smashed into the Deadly Natter's head that the danger was  
passed. Of course Hiccup didn't get up and Astrid had snapped, "Our parents' war is about to become ours. Figure out which side you  
are on!" and Hiccup had remained in a ball for at least an hour or so. The others had left her and she was shaken to the core. Why did  
there have to be sides? That Hiccup never understood. Even when she was younger, it was always the Vikings against the dragons.

After a while she got up. Hiccup decided that if Gobber didn't have anything on the Night Fury, she would just have to observe the  
dragon for a while. So she did the only thing that she could. She got a cod and bought it and a shield and went into the clearing. She  
checked to make sure that the coast was clear before she threw the fish out into the open. Nothing happened. She tried to move with  
the shield and got it stuck in between two large bolders. So much so that no matter how hard she pulled it, it remained stuck. She then  
gave up and carefully moved towards the fish and picked it up. Walking further into the clearing she held the fish out. Green eyes  
watched her carefully pearched above the girl on a rocky out crop. Toothless observed Hiccup as she spotted him. The fish pressed to  
her chest as he came down slowly from the rock, a faint hissing sound from his mouth. It was a slow and diliberate pace with which he  
made his way to her, a faint growl as he stood near her, observing her as much as she observed him. As she leaned out with the fish as  
far away from herself as she could, Toothless in his hunger crained his neck and his upper body towards the girl. Upon seeing the  
dagger she had tucked into her bealt he growled and Hiccup eventually figured it was the fact that he didn't like her dagger that led to her  
throwing it away. After Toothless had insisted on it of course. Somehow Hiccup had understood what he meant, and in doing so bought  
an understanding between them. Of course Toothless had known from the very beginning she wouldn't hurt him but he taught Hiccup a  
valuable lesson, one that she would remember when she faced new dragons. As he crept to the fish it was then that Hiccup noted that he  
didn't have teeth, "Huh, toothless...I could have swore that you had..." Just as she said that, the dragon's teeth shot into his mouth and  
he took the fish right out of her hands. It was swallowed rather rapidly after being tossed into the air and chewed a couple of times and  
the dragon licked his jaws. The fish was nice and Hiccup said softly and shakily, "teeth". Suddenly the dragon came towards her and  
before she knew it she was backed against the rock. What happened next surprised her and it would lead to a rather interesting  
revelation about the dragons as a whole. It was later in the afternoon when she was sketching Toothless in the dirt that something  
beyond her understanding happened. It proved that he was the most intelligent creature that she'd ever come across. It was the first  
time that Hiccup actually touched Toothless and it was the beginning of their unique bond.

After the stunning events of that afternoon she listened as Gobber told the tale of how his leg and arm was eaten by a dragon. It was  
when Gobber said that the wings and tail where what helped a dragon to fly that Hiccup realised what she had done. A wave of guilt  
surged through her and she got up, not hearing the rest. She ran to the forge and after a while worked out how to get Toothless flying  
again. Stunning as it was, Hiccup had to test her work and learned more about Toothless and dragons in general. The more she learned  
the more she applied. Of course she didn't expect that it would make her popular to the others.

Hiccup had lived with her dragon for five years now. As she sat at her newly complete desk writing up more to add to her own "Book of  
Dragons," Hiccup looked at all of the now free wild dragons that lived on the island where she had decided to make her new home. She  
lived in a cave with Toothless, not the best place to live, but at least it was shelter. She sighed and knew that coming to the cave was  
because of reasons out of her control. Of course she was reluctant to tell anyone about Toothless at the time and when Astrid (another  
girl who Hiccup had known a little) had found them playing together while Hiccup was trying to work out what she should do about the  
up-coming event where she was expected to kill a Monsterous Nightmare. Hiccup knew that she just couldn't kill the dragon and had  
gathered some supplies. She decided that she was going to leave Berk; and Astrid had seen her with the dragon...Hiccup knew that her  
father didn't like dragons and knew that she would most likely be exiled anyway and had taken the steps she could to protect her dragon.  
She regreted it sometimes as her life was vastly different now than what it was before. However she had learned to live with Toothless  
and while she missed her home, she didn't want to go back there. She knew that now her secret was out that doubtless her dragon  
would be killed and all of the work that she'd done with Toothless would be for nothing. It was the way her father was about dragons in  
general that made her decision the only one she could take.


End file.
